Eukaryotic microbes, principally fungi and labyrinthulomycetes, dominate biomass on bathypelagic marine snow

Author(s)
Alexander B. Bochdansky, Melissa A. Clouse, Gerhard J. Herndl
Abstract

In the bathypelagic realm of the ocean, the role of marine snow as a carbon and energy source for the deep-sea biota and as a potential hotspot of microbial diversity and activity has not received adequate attention. Here, we collected bathypelagic marine snow by gentle gravity filtration of sea water onto 30 μm filters from ∼1000 to 3900 m to investigate the relative distribution of eukaryotic microbes. Compared with sediment traps that select for fast-sinking particles, this method collects particles unbiased by settling velocity. While prokaryotes numerically exceeded eukaryotes on marine snow, eukaryotic microbes belonging to two very distant branches of the eukaryote tree, the fungi and the labyrinthulomycetes, dominated overall biomass. Being tolerant to cold temperature and high hydrostatic pressure, these saprotrophic organisms have the potential to significantly contribute to the degradation of organic matter in the deep sea. Our results demonstrate that the community composition on bathypelagic marine snow differs greatly from that in the ambient water leading to wide ecological niche separation between the two environments.

Organisation(s)
Functional and Evolutionary Ecology
External organisation(s)
Old Dominion University
Journal
The ISME Journal: multidisciplinary journal of microbial ecology
Volume
11
Pages
362-373
No. of pages
12
ISSN
1751-7362
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/ismej.2016.113
Publication date
02-2017
Peer reviewed
Yes
Austrian Fields of Science 2012
106021 Marine biology
Keywords
ASJC Scopus subject areas
Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics, Microbiology
Sustainable Development Goals
SDG 14 - Life Below Water
Portal url
https://ucris.univie.ac.at/portal/en/publications/eukaryotic-microbes-principally-fungi-and-labyrinthulomycetes-dominate-biomass-on-bathypelagic-marine-snow(f00fa77c-a9f8-4cd2-864f-38b50a78080b).html